Okay, so there has been a lot of assumptions lately about the gender distribution on our website. While I feel we have a pretty diverse membership, it seems the majority of our members ARE women, but I realized I don't actually have any idea what the distribution IS. I am polling this in the interest of curiosity and science! I am trying to structure this poll in a way that is all-inclusive but easy to see percentages of. If I missed your option, please let me know.

cwbyrvr wrote:It might have been nice to include specific trans/cis options for man and woman. At any rate, I am a cis female. I am mostly certain of this.

I was thinking, this poll is specifically about gender (not sex) and therefore you could just pick your gender, even if it was different from your sex, and we could just say all cis women and all trans women were just women. Is this a faux pas? (I don't know any transgendered people, really, so I honestly don't know.)

What was once before you - an exciting, mysterious future - is now behind you. Lived; understood; disappointing. You realize you are not special. You have struggled into existence, and are now slipping silently out of it. This is everyone's experience. Every single one. The specifics hardly matter. Everyone's everyone.

I go by woman as default. I don't ever feel like a woman (or like a man or anything else, for that matter). But I only accept female pronouns and wouldn't care to be referred to in any other form so I suppose that makes me a woman.

I'm just tired of my gender being so damn important to everyone when it comes to choices I make or interests I have. (Not talking about this poll, I mean meatspace and the rest of the internet.)

Rainbow Dolphins wrote:I was thinking, this poll is specifically about gender (not sex) and therefore you could just pick your gender, even if it was different from your sex, and we could just say all cis women and all trans women were just women. Is this a faux pas? (I don't know any transgendered people, really, so I honestly don't know.)

Yeah, I was under the impression that not including specifics such as those would be more liberating. "Yeah, I don't have a penis, so I'm technically a woman, but I feel in my heart that I'm a man." Well, okay, then you are a man. There's no need for further classification.

"He weeps for he has but one small tongue with which to taste an entire world." - Dr. Mungmung

Neko wrote:I go by woman as default. I don't ever feel like a woman (or like a man or anything else, for that matter). But I only accept female pronouns and wouldn't care to be referred to in any other form so I suppose that makes me a woman.

Yeah, I felt weird about picking "woman" too, because I don't ever particularly feel like a woman or a man... but then, I am very comfortable with my female body, dress in a way that is feminine, play up my feminine sex appeal and was raised as a girl, so I guess that makes me a woman.

Rainbow Dolphins wrote: I don't ever particularly feel like a woman or a man...

This seems pretty normal to me, I mean if you don't have a reference point to judge from like a major life change when you went from feeling one way to feeling another then what you feel is just that and I don't think it can be labeled.

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.

Sonic# wrote:If these opinions don't matter to you at all, then you are unfit for conversation

The poll could have used an internal/external sense of self modifier. Some people define gender role by personal experience. Others define gender role by social interpretation.

I'm a guy hands down, but society calls me a woman all the time due to weakness, openmindedness, idealism, understanding, and/or sensitivity. Before, it was all misconstrued as lack of confidence, and over time, it became a self-fulfilling prophecy.

You get alienated after being mocked over and over. You try to overcome it, but... society won't have it. Society likes to pile on top of those who suffer, and it creates "altruistic" dependency to demand the abused forgive their abusers.

Many women seem to suffer from this a lot too. They get stuck in "Stockholm Syndrome" relationships where they pragmatically learn to love the men who tease their minds into oblivion.

We had an interesting conversation in a class about how many of us identified as "women" vs as "females" - I sometimes use woman, but usually with a qualifier: young woman, queer woman, etc. I use "girl" more often, which is somewhat tongue in cheek.

Also, re: the trans question, I think the question as worded is totally acceptable. Many trans folks do not wish to use the trans label, and those who do (eg. someone who identifies as a trans man) could select other.

The personal is the political.

helium wrote:Every vagina is different, right? A unique and original vag-snowflake?

i was born female and whilst i have no wish to be male,i'm not thrilled at being female and i don't feel i really fit into a gender catagory. i feel i am in the middle of the gender spectrum...i think i'm just me. i wish that my gender wasn't something that had to be labelled (not here but in 'real time').

"tired of crowd searching, telepathy and hope. watch the stars, predict the past and change the world with a silver eclipse. the only thing that's permanent is destruction, we're all going to disappear, trying to leave something more permanent than myself." Sarah Kanehttp://www.tumblr.com/blog/outfitappropriate

I identify as a woman. And "woman" rather than "girl", fairly strongly, and I have done since about age 20 - perhaps this makes me unusual? I think things like being married really young have influenced this.